This riff on Claudia Roden’s Middle Eastern orange cake gets its gorgeous moist texture from boiled and puréed mandarins folded into the ginger-scented batter. It’s beautiful served warm from the oven, but equally enjoyable for a couple of days.
Ingredients
Mandarin and ginger syrup
Method
Main
1.Preheat oven to 160C and butter and flour a 12cm x 20cm loaf tin (we used a fluted loaf tin). Place mandarins in a saucepan, cover with plenty of water, bring to the boil and cook until soft (20-25 minutes). Drain, cool and chop (discard seeds), then purée in a blender or food processor.
2.Whisk eggs and sugar in an electric mixer until pale and fluffy (3-4 minutes). Fold in mandarin purée and butter, then fold in hazelnut meal, flour, ginger, baking powder and a pinch of salt. Spoon into prepared tin, smooth top and bake until golden brown and a skewer inserted withdraws clean (1-1¼ hours). Turn out onto a wire rack to cool.
3.For mandarin and ginger syrup, combine sugar, mandarin juice and 125ml water in a saucepan over medium-high heat and bring to the boil, stirring to dissolve sugar, then add the ginger and simmer until translucent and a light syrup forms (6-8 minutes). Stir in mandarin slices and lemon juice, remove from heat and leave to cool.
4.Serve cake with mandarin and ginger syrup spooned on top. Cake will keep stored in an airtight container for 3 days.
